What are the benefits and drawbacks of permanent life insurance?

Permanent life insurance can be a great product to add to your financial plan when used in the right way. Some of the most popular benefits of permanent life insurance include: Lifelong protection Accelerated benefit riders that allow access to your coverage for long term illnesses Tax-deferred growth of cash value Tax-free supplemental retirement income Some protection against creditors for your assets The downsides of permanent life insurance are: More expensive than term life insurance Cash in your policy is a long term cash accumulation strategy and ideally should not be accessed for 10-20 years